Without You
by Dark Amethyst Regni Atri
Summary: Naru reflects on her struggle to go on after Nephrite's death.


  
  


WITHOUT YOU   
  
Dedicated to someone I had to say goodbye to. 

All characters are property of Takeuchi Naoko, and any similarity to living familiar characters is dead-on accurate. :-(   
  
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"Maybe someday, I won't be so lonely  
And I'll walk on water every chance I get."  
- "Time and time again", Counting Crows  
  


WITHOUT YOU  
===========  
  


"Naru-chan - are you ok?"   
  
I've drifted in distraction over my homework once again, my head held in my hands...tears clinging to my lashes.   
  
I banish thought quickly, bringing my head up and smiling at mom's question - the same false smile I've put on for two months now. How long will I have to pretend?   
  
"Sure. Of course. I'm fine."   
  
How many lies do I have to tell before it's true?   
  
Mom returns to the kitchen, satisfied. I draw my hands over my face, wiping the deceit away, then get up from the table, leaving my untouched homework.   
  
"I'm going for a walk," I call, trying to reproduce what was once an effortlessly carefree tone. My whole life is pretence now, it seems - a façade of happiness put on for other people. They can't understand how much I love him, nor my anguish at losing him...and it would only hurt them to know. I keep it vigilantly concealed.   
  
I go out - down to the street, wandering. I'm so dark today. Some days I seem to be getting better. But then days like this come, and I'm almost worse...lower than I've ever been.   
  
I miss you, Nephrite. I'm dying without you. That's the truth.   
  
I am 'getting better', I suppose... I can go hours now without thinking of you, where once it was only seconds. Perhaps that will eventually stretch to days, even weeks...maybe even years? No - I can't believe that. I lost a part of myself when I lost you - a piece of my heart, torn away and given to you...and you will always have it. I will always remember you.   
  
Right now though, it's still a struggle to think of anything but you. I divert my mind with work and responsibilities, deaden my heart to deeper feeling...but I can only hold out so long. It's like trying not to breath - eventually I'm driven to that desperate life-sustaining gasp of air...driven to indulge in you.   
  
I recall every precious detail of you, and every touch, every word that passed between us. I live it all again - grow desperate all over again.   
  
So many sleepless nights, my hands become your hands...so many times I still cry out to you...beg for you...weep for you. How can I want you still so desperately when I never even got the chance to kiss you?   
  
How can I ever lust for someone else when my mind has you to summon? You, who does more to me in a word than they could ever hope to do to my actual flesh?   
  
Goddamnit, I'm crying again. People are looking at me.   
  
I reluctantly cross the street to the park...the very park where I lost you. I've avoided coming here. I stay away from places strong with memories of you...then every so often I'm driven to visit them all...abandoning restraint...poisoning myself anew. I just can't help it. If memories are all I'm allowed of you, then I will nurture those.   
  
I sit down at the base of a tree. It could be the same spot where we sat so close...where you smiled at me - your first real smile. I'm smiling too, recalling it, then swiftly I'm crying again, in anger, in frustration...in raw pain and loneliness...I want you, I want you...I can think nothing else. Why did I have to meet you - so deep and dark and mysterious...so bloody perfect! Why meet you then have to lose you? It isn't fair...I can't stand it. I don't want to go on. God knows I would go to you, my love - wherever you've gone...even if it's nothingness...but I can't.   
  
I can't.   
  
I'm tied here, so absolutely...so cunningly...with invisible, intangible bonds. Family...friends...the world I had before I met you - a world that seems so different now that I feel like an actor in a play...a smaller world - emptier, and more pointless.   
  
Why did I have to meet you? To fall in love - love like I've never known, only dreamt of? Damn you! But I can't damn you...it's not your fault. Damn God? I don't believe in that nonsense. There's no one to blame, except myself. I sought you out...glutted myself on you...drank my own poison, knowingly. I must suppress my fury along with my sorrow.   
  
Wherever you are, love, I hope you're not going through any of this. I envy you if you are in darkness...silence...oblivion. I wish I were with you there. I have been at that threshold, looked within...but I can't do that either, for all the same reasons.   
  
I love those reasons, of course. I want to be with them, of course. But I hate them too - icy cold hatred...for they keep me from following you and all that could mean...and my memories of you - and yours of me - they will steal those too, eventually, by stealing my time...and I could strike them dead for that.   
  
I lay back on the grass, looking up at the darkening sky, enjoying the cool breath of wind on my hot face. White clouds sail slowly across grey sky. The earth is comfortingly sure and solid beneath me. My anger is abating. Night is coming. And at night, you return to me. I can't wait...   
  
I trail a finger idly across my cheek and then my lips, abstractedly, teasingly, my body so eager for you, for its master. My finger slips lower, to toy with a nipple - not considering that anyone might see me...lost in sensation. I close my eyes, and you are here. Your feather touch becomes more insistent, pulling at my nipple under my thin cotton shirt, then pinching it as it hardens.   
  
My pulse and breath quicken in delight at your touch - my center throbbing, begging...and when you move your hand there, stroking me through the thin damp fabric, I cry out in bliss, my chest arching, my hand returning to my breast to squeeze it hard. I slide the palm of my other hand over my face, over my mouth, kissing it hungrily, still only barely aware that it is not you.   
  
I lay still for some time, savouring the ecstasy, devouring you in my mind, before I realize how cold I am...and then, where I am. I feel slightly ill, suddenly. At nights, sweating and sated, lying groggy in my familiar bed, I always imagine your arms around me...and for a short while, I know peace...but now I just shrink at what I have done, how far off-balance I have become... Am I losing my mind?   
  
My thoughts are interrupted. Did I hear my name being called? I sit up.   
  
I swear I do. I narrow my eyes as I listen harder, turning my head around, seeking the source. Again I hear it. And again, before I recognize it as Usagi's voice.   
  
I get up and move towards the sound, then startle as I bump hard into her, coming around the trunk of a tree. She screeches in fear, then laughs, clutching me for support. Her touch is comforting, and I hold her shoulder for reassurance, grateful for her cheer and distraction.   
  
"Your mom is looking for you," says Usagi-chan, recovering enough to speak. "It's getting late y'know."   
  
"Sorry," I answer, trying to rally-up my cheerful façade once again. Usagi, more than anyone else, will sense if I'm unhappy.   
  
"I thought maybe you might be here," she says, looking around slightly nervously, shy of the subject of Nephrite, knowing how deeply I felt, how I suffered...giving me the credit for continuing to suffer and not just forgetting him, like passing fancy. Bless you, Usagi-chan, for saying that. It means so much to me.   
  
"Are you ok?"   
  
Standing here, her hand now in mine, her wide blue eyes full of compassion and understanding, I feel for a moment that I just might be.   
  
"Sure. I'm fine. Thanks." I hug her a moment, gratefully.   
  
I miss you, Nephrite. I always will miss you...but to have someone who understands that...for some reason, it helps. It might just be the truth at last. At least at this moment, I'm ok.  
  



End file.
